A sandstone figure depicting Uma-Maheshvara, Northern India, Madhya Pradesh, Pratihara dynasty, 8th - 9th century | 北印度 中央邦 普臘蒂哈臘王朝 八至九世紀 砂岩石雕烏瑪–大自在天坐像

The four-armed Maheśhvara holds a fruit in his lowered right hand and the body of a serpent remaining from the missing upper right hand. The shaft of a trisula emerges from his raised left hand, and he rests the other arm on his consort’s shoulder. His wife Umā is seated in maharajalilasana, lovingly holding their son Skanda with her left hand while reaching down with her right to their elephant-headed son, Ganesha, who gazes up from below. Shiva’s bull Nandin, or Vrishabha, stands on the left and the dancing skeletal devotee Bhrngi on the right. The incised marks on the pedestal indicate the rocks of Shiva’s Himalayan family retreat, Mount Kailash. The finely carved and tender portrayal of Shiva and Parvati in their Himalayan Mountain home maintains a much-loved Indian iconographic tradition depicting the great ascetic god, the Lord of Yogis, together with his close family. Compare the complex movement and juxtaposition of the figures, and otherworldly expressions on the faces of an important eighth century relief depicting Ganga and her entourage from the Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, see Stella Kramrisch, Manifestations of Shiva, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1981, cat. 75. And compare Uma’s profile with an eighth century Madhya Pradesh fragmentary royal personage, ibid, pl. 54.